Before I Say I Do

by Vicki Bradley

  ‘Police! Stop!’

  It was Loxton, in the clearing, her hand outstretched. They’d found me and the relief was overwhelming.

  ‘Fuck off!’ Spit flew from Lucy’s mouth.

  ‘Put the weapon down.’ Loxton put her palms up.

  ‘Take one more step and I’ll kill her.’ Lucy waved the lock towards me.

  ‘I’m going to stay right here.’ Loxton still had her hands up, she hadn’t moved. ‘You’re in control.’

  I looked from one woman to the other. ‘She killed Rachel! She killed my sister!’ I shouted to Loxton. Whatever happened, Lucy wasn’t going to get away with this.

  Loxton ignored me, only looking at Lucy. Her voice was surprisingly calm. ‘What do you want to happen, Lucy?’

  She laughed.‘How the hell should I know? Everything’s fucked up.’

  ‘No, it’s not.’ Loxton shook her head. ‘We can talk about this.’

  ‘I killed Mark. What’s there to talk about?’ Lucy shrugged. She still had the steering lock above her head and her eyes kept flicking between me and Loxton. ‘You’re just going to lock me up for ever.’

  ‘Mark’s alive,’ Loxton said.

  Relief flooded through me – I couldn’t believe it. Tears sprang to my eyes.

  ‘That’s just great.’ Lucy’s voice got louder until she was suddenly shouting. ‘That dickhead’s not dead. Are you sure?’

  ‘He’s in a coma, but he’s alive.’

  ‘I still killed Rachel and Jonny. You can’t bring them back to life, can you?’ Lucy’s eyes focused on me.

  She’d killed Jonny?

  Loxton looked taken aback for a moment.

  ‘Don’t bullshit me that I’ll be out in a couple of years, because I won’t. I’m not an idiot, Loxton. There’s no way out for me.’

  ‘You need help.’ Loxton took a step forward. ‘The courts are very understanding.’

  Lucy shook her head and waved the steering lock at Loxton. ‘You stay back. You think I’m mental? I’m not mad. It’s the world that’s mad.’

  ‘What do you want?’ Loxton asked.

  ‘All I wanted was for her to love me. It wasn’t much.’ She glared at me. ‘But no, instead she used me, and as soon as her life was complete, she tried to toss me aside.’

  ‘Toss you aside? You were my bridesmaid.’ I wanted to kill her, but my wrist throbbed so much I felt sick.

  ‘I know you’d have ended up going to America. You’re so fucking weak. You do whatever that dick tells you to do. You would have put him before me, no danger.’

  ‘That’s not true.’ I couldn’t believe I was arguing with her like this. After everything she’d done.

  DC Kowalski came into view. He was behind Lucy but a good ten metres away.

  ‘You always put men before me. You kept saying our friendship was everything, but I should have known you’d let me down. Just like everyone else.’

  ‘You’re like a child. You never grew up. The rest of us moved on with our lives,’ I shouted at her.

  Loxton threw me a look of frustration; she was silently telling me to shut up. ‘Who let you down?’ Loxton asked.

  ‘My father,’ Lucy’s voice dropped. She hadn’t spoken about him in years. Had refused to talk about it. ‘He put booze before me. He used to beat me.’

  ‘So, you’re going to blame all of this on your father?’ I couldn’t help myself. ‘None of this is your fault . . .’ I didn’t want to hear her excuses. Kowalski was creeping towards her. For such a big man, he didn’t make a sound.

  ‘You’ve muddled everything up, made it sound all wrong. All I’ve ever done is try to make your life better, like you made mine better. Before you came into my life, I had no one. I didn’t know what happiness was until I met you. Remember that first day of school, when I’d caught that butterfly in the playground and you saw me with it. You came over and I let you hold it.’

  I did remember.

  ‘You were the only person who ever tried to protect me from my dad,’ Lucy said. ‘My mum didn’t. My parents didn’t like me and yours ignored you. I thought that meant something, all the things we went through together.’

  ‘I did care.’ Our eyes met. I saw all the years of pain we carried between us.

  Kowalski was five metres away now. Loxton was motionless, watching Lucy like a lioness ready to pounce.

  For a second, Lucy’s resolve seemed to fail. ‘Why are we talking about all this? We can’t go back.’ She lowered the steering lock.

  ‘It’s never too late,’ I lied.

  At that moment Kowalski grabbed the steering lock and Loxton sprinted towards Lucy. Kowalski wrestled it from Lucy’s hands, and she lashed out in retaliation, scratching at his face. Loxton grabbed hold of her wrist, but Lucy punched her in the face, pulled free and ran towards the brook. Kowalski threw the steering lock behind him and chased after her. Loxton was faster, racing past him, and tackled Lucy to the ground. Kowalski kneeled down on Lucy’s body and snapped handcuffs on her. She thrashed against them but then all the fight drained out of her as she realized it was over.

  I staggered over to them and stood looking down at Lucy. Her eyes met mine. ‘Betrayed me again,’ she said.

  ‘You murdered Rachel.’ I cradled my broken wrist with my good hand. ‘Every awful thing that’s ever happened in my life is your fault.’

  ‘Not everything.’ She glared up at me. ‘Mark was all yours.’

  Chapter 52

  Alana Loxton

  Friday

  Loxton sat next to Webb in the back of the car, the woman who had hidden in plain sight, as Kowalski drove them back to Walworth police station. Lucy was handcuffed with her hands behind her back, but Loxton still kept her eyes on her. Kowalski had made sure the child safety locks were on, too.

  ‘Julia needs to understand that everything I did was for her,’ Webb said. ‘I want you to tell her. It’s all been muddled up by you lot. I killed them to protect her.’

  ‘You’re under caution,’ Loxton said.

  ‘But I’ve not been able to speak to my solicitor yet, so this will all be inadmissible in the end.’ Webb gave her a little half-smile.

  Loxton hated to admit it, but Webb was probably right – the courts were so weak. ‘You’re still under arrest; anything you say can be used as evidence at court.’

  Lucy gave a bitter laugh. ‘Still playing your part. I heard another officer say you were suspended, so you can drop all that crap. When I walk into that interview room, I’m going “no comment”, so this is your only chance, Alana.’

  Loxton kept her face impassive. It’d been a mistake taking her in the car, but she hadn’t wanted to leave Kowalski to transport Webb back to Walworth on his own.

  ‘How did you do it?’ Kowalski asked, quietly, clearly aware that he was breaking police protocol. ‘How did you get Mark into that basement?’ Loxton’s eyes met his in the rear-view mirror. They shouldn’t ask Webb, but they both needed to know.

  ‘I waited for him outside Emily Hart’s block of flats and used a syringe of ketamine; he never saw me coming. Then this homeless guy came towards me. He attacked me and I had to defend myself, so I hit him with my steering lock.’

  ‘Robert McGregor. He was old and no threat to you.’

  ‘Not much of a loss then. I did the world a favour. It threw you lot off the scent for a while, putting Rowthorn’s watch on him.’

  Loxton winced inwardly. ‘Robert McGregor had children.’

  ‘They’re probably glad he’s dead. He was a drinker, wasn’t he? He stank to high heaven. You know he was covered in shit. Not just from when I hit him. He hadn’t washed in weeks – disgusting. I gave him his first proper bath in a long while.’ She smiled.

  ‘He was still alive when you threw him into the river. He drowned.’ Loxton imagined McGregor clawing at the surface, trying to get a gasp of precious air as it felt like his lungs were exploding. Fear and confusion and the icy-cold water his only company.

  ‘Tough as an ol
d cockroach, that one. All drunks are cockroaches; my father certainly was. They’re a drain on society.’ She spat the last words out.

  ‘What did Mark do?’

  ‘Just opened and closed his mouth like a goldfish. The fight just left him and he passed out.’

  ‘No surprise after you’d injected him with a horse tranquilizer.’ Kowalski’s voice shook with anger.

  ‘What did you do then?’ Loxton asked, glaring at Kowalski to quieten him. They needed to keep Webb onside, keep her talking.

  ‘I loaded them both into the boot of my car. I thought they were both dead. When I got to Surrey Docks, I pushed the homeless guy into the river, hoping the police wouldn’t care too much about him.’

  Loxton felt sick. She longed to be out of the car and away from Webb. Just her presence was intimidating.

  ‘Then I drove Mark home. It was just starting to get dark; everyone was inside having their dinners. He was heavy but I got him inside, pretending he was drunk and I was his girlfriend. I thought pushing him down the basement stairs would have finished him off, but it didn’t.’

  ‘Why didn’t you kill him?’

  ‘Killing the homeless man spooked me. It wasn’t part of the plan. Mark was meant to go in the river, not the old man, but two bodies would look odd. Less like a suicide. And then you were all running around looking for Mark, more than I thought you would. I was worried if I killed him in my house the stench would alert the neighbours. That’s how people always get caught – the smell. I had enough ketamine left to keep him quiet until I figured out how to make it look convincingly like he’d killed himself. I was thinking of a bag over the head in a secluded wood and hope you didn’t question the ketamine, assuming he’d taken it himself. I even got him to write a suicide note. It’s amazing what people will do to avoid pain.’

  Kowalski shook his head slowly in disgust. Webb didn’t miss a thing and slammed her feet into the passenger seat in front of her. ‘That womanising cokehead didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as Julia. He deserved everything he got.’

  ‘Lucy, I want to understand.’ But Loxton wasn’t sure that she did want to understand. How had she missed what was right in front of her?

  Webb turned to Loxton and eyed her suspiciously, but she calmed down.

  ‘How does Jonathan Cane fit into all of this?’ Loxton asked.

  ‘Julia’s fault. She had to drag him out of his little box. She wouldn’t listen to me. She never does and that’s why we’re here. She went to see him without telling me, but I followed her. I had no choice.’

  ‘What did you do?’ Loxton had to know, even if she couldn’t use anything Webb said in evidence.

  ‘Julia had done half the job for me. They’d had a fight and she’d knocked him out. His head was quite bad. Once she’d left, I administered the ketamine. Couldn’t have him calling you lot, dragging up the past, going on about being innocent.’

  Loxton felt lightheaded. She’d spent her career trying to prove that women were as capable as men. This felt like the universe was playing a sick joke on her. Webb was the perfect murderer, as capable as any man she’d ever investigated.

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t examine another dead junkie dealer too hard. Guess I was wrong.’ She rolled her eyes at her own mistake.

  ‘How did you even get ketamine?’ Kowalski asked.

  ‘I bought it through the dark net. It came in skin rejuvenation bottles. It’s unbelievable, right?’

  ‘How did you pay for it?’ Kowalski was struggling to keep his voice calm.

  ‘With Mark’s money, which I transferred into Bitcoin. Idiot told me his hidden bank details after some persuasion.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you’ll give us access now?’

  ‘I was going to use the Bitcoin for me and Julia to get away. It can rot in cyber space now.’

  ‘And what about Emily Hart?’

  ‘She was a whore. I worked out Mark was cheating months ago. It was obvious. Julia suspected, but the more I tried to show her, the less she wanted to see. I sent Mark some threatening texts before the wedding, telling him I knew what he’d done. That he’d burn for it. It didn’t stop him though. He just carried on as normal. That’s why I had to intervene.’

  ‘But why kill Hart?’

  ‘She’s the same size as me – similar hair colour although hers was dyed. I wanted to conduct an experiment to see if Julia would save Mark over me. I sent her a WhatsApp from Mark’s phone and she came running, thinking he’d chosen her at last, and had just gone missing to escape the wedding. She didn’t see it coming at all. I drugged her and tied her up. I set up a choice for Julia: save Mark from burning or save me. And I got my answer.’ Lucy looked down at her hands and for the first time Loxton saw pain in her eyes.

  ‘What were you going to do in the woods just now?’ Kowalski asked.

  ‘I don’t know, do I?’ Webb shrugged. ‘You showed up.’

  ‘Were you going to hurt Julia?’ Loxton asked.

  ‘I wanted to.’ Webb’s face was contorted in anger and confusion. She shook her head as if she was being torn in two. ‘I could never do it for real. That’s why I saved her from the fire. It’s always been like that. She drives me mad sometimes, but in the end she’s all I’ve ever had.’

  ‘You have no problem with killing,’ Loxton said. ‘You took Julia to the woods to kill her just like you murdered her sister.’

  ‘Rachel was an accident. All I ever did was try to protect Julia from the world. But it looks like the world won.’ Lucy turned her face away and stared out of the window. It seemed she was done talking.

  *

  ‘Patel’s going to interview her.’ Kowalski sat at his desk. He looked about as bad as she felt.

  ‘Alone?’ Loxton asked. She liked Patel; she didn’t want her to be on her own with Webb.

  ‘Winter thought it was the best idea. A woman-to-woman chat.’ If Kowalski was disappointed at being pushed aside by his boss, he didn’t show it.

  ‘Is she taking over the case?’ Loxton wished she could be in that interview room.

  ‘Kanwar is,’ Kowalski said. ‘You’re out and I’ve fallen from grace after continuing to work with you.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said just as Kanwar marched into the office and headed towards Kowalski. ‘Ready to watch a pro nail this at court?’ Kanwar barged past Loxton, forcing her to step back.

  ‘Be our guest,’ Kowalski said. ‘But, remember, we got her to custody.’

  ‘Plenty of suspects have been in police custody and walked at court. It’s the final kill that counts.’ Kanwar grinned at Kowalski and threw Loxton a sideways glance. Loxton kept her face neutral, but her jaw clenched involuntarily. The corners of Kanwar’s lips raised slightly.

  ‘Just make sure you get her.’ Kowalski looked too tired to argue.

  Kanwar turned his back on Loxton as he talked to Kowalski. ‘What is she doing in here?’

  Loxton’s face and chest heated up but there was nothing she could say. Kanwar would never believe her that she hadn’t been the leak.

  ‘If Winter finds her here, you’ll be in even more shit than you already are, Kowalski.’ Kanwar shook his head. ‘Why are you messing up your career for her? She tipped off the press. I don’t get it, mate.’

  ‘It was Loxton who realized Webb and Talbot were still alive. There wasn’t much time, so we headed there together. Anyway, we were just leaving.’

  ‘Good. I best get on. Catch you later, Kowalski.’ Kanwar strode out of the office, his expensive aftershave lingering in the air long after he’d left the room.

  Kowalski rolled his eyes at Loxton.

  ‘It’s not his fault,’ Loxton said, although she couldn’t help but feel hurt by Kanwar. She began gathering up her belongings.

  ‘I’ll keep you updated with what happens with the Webb case.’ Kowalski helped her pack. ‘And I know a good federation representative who can help you with this news leak thing.’

  ‘Thanks, Dominik, that’s—’r />
  But she was interrupted by Winter charging into the office. ‘What is wrong with you?’ He looked incandescent with rage.

  Kanwar must have called him as soon as he’d left. Loxton hadn’t realized how much he hated her.

  ‘I was just leaving.’ Loxton felt her shame twist into anger. She hadn’t done anything wrong.

  ‘You’re not allowed to be on police property.’ Winter’s voice shook with anger. ‘You don’t work here anymore. You’re trespassing.’

  ‘It just all happened so fast,’ she said, pulling her jacket on.‘I’m sorry.’ She didn’t want Kowalski to get in trouble.

  ‘This isn’t going to look good for your disciplinary board, sneaking around the police station when you’re suspended.’ Winter shook his head at her.

  ‘I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking. I—’

  ‘Save it, Loxton. There’s no reason for you to be here. Get out before I do something I regret.’ He glared at her, a disgusted look on his face. Was he so angry because he thought she was looking for evidence to identify the leak and he was worried she’d find out it was him?

  Kowalski stepped forward. ‘Sir, without Loxton, Talbot might not be alive. It was Loxton who made me look for Webb.’

  ‘Kowalski, I’ve known you a long time. I never thought you were capable of this. Both of you get out of my sight. I don’t want to see her anywhere near this police station again.’

  Loxton didn’t care what Winter thought. It looked like he was out to ruin her anyway, pinning the leak on her. But she’d got to the truth of what had happened to Rowthorn. And she was going to find out who the police leak was, however long it took.

  Chapter 53

  Kayleigh Webb

  Monday 24 July 2000

  Kayleigh watched Rachel running round and round the clearing, calling Jenny’s name – but Jenny didn’t answer. Jenny wasn’t here.

  Rachel was crying to go home, but she didn’t seem to know which way home was. She would set off in one direction, and then stop, turn around and hurry back to the clearing snivelling.

  The trees towered above Rachel’s tiny figure, their branches reaching down to try to tug at her hair. All around, shadows were forming. Rachel was clutching that bloody toy rabbit and her face was full of snot and tears.